Saturday Matinee – Hey Baby ’59

Before you click on that first video, I gotta tell you something. Bunkarina sent it to me from the living room last night. Although I recognized the song immediately, I couldn’t name it or identify the original artist, let alone date it correctly. Had I been betting, I would have lost my shorts.

Now THAT is how to ask a girl to Senior Prom. Had I only known.

Hey Baby. On the beach.

In the rec hall. From the comments: Ha! – check out :34 – :36, looks like she’s popping her head in the door and thinking about being your girl!

DJ Ötzi’s version is cool, too.

That’s Bruce Channel and Delbert McClinton in 2003. Channel wrote it in 1959, recorded it, and it became a No 1 Hit in 1962.

50 years later, it’s still a hit for a high school prom invitation, and that makes me smile. Have a great weekend folks. See you back here tomorrow, when I will explain why “boobs” is now in the tagline.

Saturday Matinee – Vinyl Throw, Blackboard Jungle, Groovie Movie, & Hellzapoppin’

Even though it looks like a hoax, it makes me sad – no respect.

Yeah Daddio, Blackboard Jungle, 1955. Not much has changed since then, and they busted 78s in that movie, too. On the other hand, it introduced Bill Haley & The Comets, redefined them from rockabilly into rock and roll.

“Groovie Movie” short from 1944 – How to Jitterbug. Pay attention – there’s some hot stuff there, but nothing beats the Slim Slam Allstars.

Slim Galliard (piano, guitar) and Slam Stewart (bass) from the 1941 movie Hellzapoppin’. Killer stuff, that. Yeah, we posted it before, but so what. It’s great, especially because the clip begins with a tribute to jazz that was still popular just a few years prior.

Have a great weekend, folks, and tell your mom Bunk said Happy Mothers Day.

Saturday Matinee & Cinco de Mayo – Tijuana Brass, Snacktime, Tim Armstrong & HorrorPops

Cinco de Mayo has its roots in the French occupation of Mexico, which took place in the aftermath of the Mexican-American War of 1846-48, the Mexican Civil War of 1858, and the 1860 Reform Wars. These wars left the Mexican Treasury in ruins and nearly bankrupt. On July 17, 1861, Mexican President Benito Juárez issued a moratorium in which all foreign debt payments would be suspended for two years. In response, France, Britain, and Spain sent naval forces to Veracruz to demand reimbursement. Britain and Spain negotiated with Mexico and withdrew, but France, at the time ruled by Napoleon III, decided to use the opportunity to establish a Latin empire in Mexico that would favor French interests, the Second Mexican Empire. [Wiki]

So in other words, a nearly bankrupt country stopped paying bills until three big debt collectors showed up. Two of them settled, but the third took it a step further. Mr. Françoise (aka Lucky Pierre) knocked on the door and said, “Nice place you got here. Shame if anything should happen to it.” The rest is history.

In celebration of Cinco de Mayo, here’s Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass with some very embarrassing people of European heritage dancing. (No one in Alpert’s band was actually Hispanic.)

Jonco finds stuff on the internest that nobody else can see, and here’s proof.

Tim Armstrong Ska. [via]

Any band named HorrorPops gets my vote (and we’ve posted about them here before). There’s something inherently cool about a mashup between punk, psychobilly, hotrods and Denmark. Besides, they got a curvy girl with tatts on stand up bass singing lead.

With that, have a great weekend, folks.

Saturday Matinee – Froggy Chillin’, Leon Redbone, Lonnie Johnson, Bob Brozman, Bonnie Raitt & Roy Rogers

Froggy be chillin’.

“I’m just an entertainer, and I use music as a medium for entertaining. But I’m not really an entertainer either, because to be an entertainer it implies you have a great desire to want to entertain.”
Leon Redbone

Leon Redbone‘s take on Lonnie Johnson’s “Mr. Jelly Roll Baker” in 2009. (BTW, “jelly roll” was slang for something other than a pastry.)

On growing up in New Orleans Parish: “There was music all around us, and in my family you’d better play something, even if you just banged on a tin can.”
Lonnie Johnson

Lonnie Johnson created the single-note guitar solo in the 1920s, and decades passed before the guitar was regarded as more than a background rhythm instrument. I don’t know who’s on drums or piano, but that’s Willie Dixon on bass, and the vid is likely from the mid to late 1960s.

My first impression of “ethnomusicologist” Bob Brozman was that he’s a pretentious jerk. On the other hand, he’s crammed some great country/Delta blues licks into his American Steel.

Let’s wrap this baboso up with two of the greatest modern day slide guitar players, on stage together in Austin: Bonnie Raitt & Roy Rogers jamming “Gnawin’ On It.”

So gnaw on that, folks, and have a great weekend.

Saturday Matinee – Space Night, John Prine, Walk Off The Earth, Cowboy Mouth & Rick Danko

Inspired by a version of the opening sequence of this clip called ‘What does it feel like to fly over planet Earth?’, I tracked down the original time-lapse sequence taken on the International Space Station (ISS) via NASA, found some additional ones there, including the spectacular Aurora Australis sequences, and set it to a soundtrack that almost matches the awe and wonder I feel when I see our home from above.

Time lapse of Earth at night is VERY cool.

For all the haole napo’opo’o here, John Prine‘s “Let’s Talk Dirty In Hawaiian” fills in the gaps.

Walk Off The Earth performs The Beatles‘ “From Me To You.”

Cowboy Mouth Rocks the House. From the Utoobage comments:

part theater, part revival, part frat party, part mardi gras. you will be forever changed after a CM show, whether fred sprays you with sweat, tosses you a drum stick, snarls-smiles, exhorts you to leap, sing or get down. its a jolt of energy. you wont need caffeine for days.

The late Rick Danko‘s acoustic version of “When You Awake.” RIP Levon Helm.

That’s a wrap. Have a great weekend, folks.

Saturday Matinee – Black Joe Lewis & The Honeybears, The Bamboos, & Rufus Thomas

Black Joe Lewis and the Honeybears ” Sugarfoot.” Pure retro soul/funk.

The Bamboos, live at Revolver 2006. I recognize the song but don’t know the name.

Rufus Thomas, live at Wattstax 1972, with “Breakdown.”

That’s a wrap for a late post, and enough funk R&B and soul to hold you until tomorrow (or not). Have  a great weekend.

Saturday Matinee – The Osmonds, Imelda May, The Black Keys

The Osmonds‘ “Crazy Horses.” I dare you to watch the whole thing. I couldn’t handle it. Now for some eye & ear bleach:

Imelda May‘s take on Johnny Burnette‘s take on Tiny Bradshaw‘s “Train Kept A-Rollin.”
[Nice find by Iowahawk]

The Black Keys, live at Abbey Road 2009. That should make up for the first vid, and with that, I’m out for now. Happy Passover & Easter to all.

Saturday Matinee – Slinky Workout, Eating Wood Grubs, Judex, Ruin & The Cowsills

[Found here.] And speaking of slinkys…

…be sure to watch this, especially if you’re squeamish. [via]

Apparently this was from a French 1963 remake of a 1914 film about a crime fighter who wears masks. [Found here.]

Ruin is an animated action short film set “way in the future” in a green post-apocalyptic universe. Directed by Wes Ball, who has been working in Hollywood for 8 years doing graphic work for HBO and DVD/Blu-ray featureetes.  Described as his “passion project”, Ball has been working on Ruin off and on for the last two years.

[Found here.] And now we’re gonna rock.

This last one made me wanna puke, too, and I’d rather overwork a slinky, eat a giant wood grub, don a cockatiel head and ride the Road to Ruin than hear that again. Have a great weekend folks. See you back here tomorrow for palate cleansers.

Saturday Matinee – Tommy Makem & Liam Clancy, The Fenians, Gaelic Storm & The Pogues

Tommy Makem & Liam Clancy singing “Mary Mack” at National Stadium, Dublin, February 1977.

The Fenians‘ “Token Whiskey Song.” We followed Terry Casey & Co. back when they were the house band at The Harp. Good peeps, all of ’em. (Their version of  “Rattlin’ Bog” is one of my favorites because they added some verses.)

Gaelic Storm‘s Patrick Murphy tells the tale leading up to the classic Irish traditional song “The Night I Punched Russell Crowe In The Head.”

What’s St. Patrick’s Day without a Pogues vid? Dare you to figure out what Shane McGowan is, um, singing.

That should keep you set for a bit while I dodge out for some Harp Lager and Mulligan Stew. Have a great St. Patrick’s Day, see you back here first thing Sunday.

[Related posts here, and don’t miss the story behind Nell Flaherty’s Drake.]

Saturday Matinee – Slim Harpo, The O’Jays & The Persuasions

Slim Harpo‘s “Scratch My Back.”

O’Jays stroll on Soul Train. [h/t Gwendolyn W.]

The Persuasions are one of the best a capella groups ever. Frank Zappa referred to bassman Jimmy “Bro” Hayes as “The Human Sub-Woofer.” (The Persuasion’s tribute to Zappa Frankly A Cappella is excellent, btw.)

And I’m out of time for tonight, so have a great weekend folks. See you tomorrow.